So true. Listen to Horner's scores for Glory and Braveheart. They're nearly identical. That said, the score Braveheart is maybe my favorite of all time.

You know, the whole thing about Rey fighting like Palpatine because she thrusts with the lightsaber is such a weak argument, but it's BS even beyond that. Finn does it at least twice.

hey answer me this....

Rey is a scavenger on a desert planet who basically has never left or never leaves because she is waiting for her family.

I get that as a scavenger she has rattled around inside crashed ships of all kinds and maybe even the MF as it is sitting there in Unkar's junkyard.

But she basically appears to be able to easily fly just about anything.

I could rattle around inside a crashed 747 for 10 years but that doesn't mean I could fly it.

I get she has some mechanical aptitude - but flying is a different concept, aerodynamics and all that.

are we just supposed to accept that as part of the - she's got super force powers - and it applies to flying?

From the movie alone, she said she had flown other ships but never left the planet. We are obviously supposed to assume the force angle as well.

From the EU we know that she had a working flight sim that she used to pass the time (the flight computer salvaged from a downed ship). She also restored and flew a Ghtroc freighter before having it stolen.

There's apparently some kind of official backstory about her piloting junkers all over that area growing up. Like just tooling around or something. But, yet again, something we're just supposed to infer, which is one of TFA's main weaknesses. So much info/backstory we're just supposed to assume/guess.

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There's apparently some kind of official backstory about her piloting junkers all over that area growing up. Like just tooling around or something. But, yet again, something we're just supposed to infer, which is one of TFA's main weaknesses. So much info/backstory we're just supposed to assume/guess.

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Actually AliassMan02 alluded to it.

There is an actual book that was released around the time TFA premiered last year that provides some back story on Rey, Finn, and Poe. In Rey's portion, she trained heavily on a flight simulator and flew ships on Jakku, just never left. I can't recall the name of the book but I read it. There are numerous other books that provide everything from the First Order was formed to what Han and Leia were doing between ROTJ and TFA. The formation of the New Republic. Where Hux came from. Etc.

It's very strange to me that Disney/Lucasfilm choose to go this route. 95% of the people around the world that saw TFA are never going to read those books. Few even know they exist and really how would you unless you are a nerd (guilty) or you were tooling around on Amazon for SW stuff.

Of course good world building means having characters and places with backstory and history. But there's an organic, graceful way to dole out/allude to backstory and history, and having a character quickly and offhandedly refer to once having piloted ships is not the way to do that. I'm not asking for an over-expository chunk of dialogue, or an entire plot point around it, but the way they handled that - along with a handful of other instances - just felt clunky in my opinion.

Isn't that exactly how to make it not feel clunky? How would you have handled it?

I think they tried more subtle with the the Rebel pilot doll and the like, but yes it was not done as well as Luke's piloting was introduced in IV

Have her actually be piloting something when we meet her. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE her character intro as is, but there were ways and opportunities to make it more a part of her character before she actually jumps in the cockpit of the Falcon. I didn't mean add more dialogue, but rather organically make the pilot aspect more a part of her character somehow. Something we see that didn't need to be explained.

Yeah, honestly, having Finn pilot the Falcon in that moment would have made way more sense, with way fewer tweaks. I get why they did it the way they did - so Rey could pilot the Falcon at the end of the movie as well - but Chewie could have just as easily taken over Han's seat and been the main pilot when they go to meet Luke. The whole pilot angle feels forced with Rey, anyway. It never pays off like it does with Luke. She could still be a mechanical wiz without that aspect.

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Yeah, honestly, having Finn pilot the Falcon in that moment would have made way more sense, with way fewer tweaks. I get why they did it the way they did - so Rey could pilot the Falcon at the end of the movie as well - but Chewie could have just as easily taken over Han's seat and been the main pilot when they go to meet Luke. The whole pilot angle feels forced with Rey, anyway. It never pays off like it does with Luke. She could still be a mechanical wiz without that aspect.

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Ag 83 handled this, but it's like you don't even pay attention to what happens in the movie when you say stuff like this.

I brought the question up. I will say like someone else it didn't really bother me. In fact it wasn't even really until my 5th or 6th viewing. Just a kinda hmmmmm

If she said in the movie she had flown anything I missed it. I know she was around the stuff. But I took the pilot helmet and other things like the doll as wishful Thinking for a poor scavenger.

I wouldn't expect a lot of time on it. But even a throwaway line about flying a lot of simulators would have at least made me not question it. Implausible still, yes, but answered.

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Of course good world building means having characters and places with backstory and history. But there's an organic, graceful way to dole out/allude to backstory and history, and having a character quickly and offhandedly refer to once having piloted ships is not the way to do that. I'm not asking for an over-expository chunk of dialogue, or an entire plot point around it, but the way they handled that - along with a handful of other instances - just felt clunky in my opinion.

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"You bet I could, I'm not such a bad pilot myself!"

"I used to bullseye womp rats in my T-16 back home, they're not much bigger than 2 meters."

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Bingo.

There is more detail to the Star Wars universe than could ever be put to film. The new EU stuff just fills in gaps with bonus, non-essential material that comes from the Story Group. Megafans can learn more and fill time between movies with secondary adventures. I'll know who Saw Gerrera was as a young revolutionary before we meet him in Rogue One, but literally 99 percent of movie goers won't, and we'll have the same experience in the theater. I'm glad to be able to scour the secondary material.

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If she said in the movie she had flown anything I missed it.

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Other than her telling Finn she's a pilot, it was just one very quick line once they leave Jakku. The important thing was just knowing she could fly.

Pretty much very character we meet in the classic trilogy, except Ben and Yoda, can and does fly a starship.

Sure but we didn't meet many orphan scavengers who barely are making enough to eat on desert planets that they've never left.

Anyway. Fine she's a pilot.

First, to address the we-never-saw-Luke-be-a-pilot thing, in attempt to compare that to Rey's situation - it's just not the same. At all. Luke's one and only goal in A New Hope is to literally become a pilot. That's all he wants in life, and his enthusiasm is enough for us to believe in him. We want it because he wants it. It's as simple as that. Then, when he finally gets his chance, he not only delivers on his word, but his goal - and achievement of that goal - is absolutely integral to not only the Rebel's main strategy, but the very defeat of the Empire itself.

With Rey, again, her piloting skills are completely inconsequential to the greater narrative, she never expresses any desire whatsoever to become a pilot (save for her wearing that helmet while she eats, which really doesn't tell us anything), and there's never any real payoff to her piloting skills, other than she kind of sort of inherits the Falcon in the end.

Secondly, when I said Finn should have just piloted the Falcon himself in that initial scene, I was obviously implying that there would have to be more changes than just that. Of course I remember that he needed Poe / a pilot to escape. But, you know, it's a made-up scenario. We don't have to stay within the rigid restrictions already established. So I probably would have just lost Poe altogether. Have him in the same basic opening scene, have him hide the plans in BB-8, but then die in that ambush. Then it's more heartbreaking when BB-8 is on his own, and Finn could escape after that sequence in much the same way, only this time he's the pilot. Sure, when Kylo tortures Poe, it gives the audience something to compare to when Kylo attempts the same technique on Rey later on, but there could have been ways around that. And then we wouldn't have had to deal with the awkward Poe-disappears-in-the-crash-but-is-still-alive-later-on thing. And look, I'm sure Rian Johnson has found a way to give Poe a more relevant/integral arc in Episode VIII, and I may end up absolutely loving him in the next movie. But in TFA, he was almost a non-character. More than anything, he was a convenient device.

It's just weird to me sometimes how some of you hold onto movies like this and can't admit even the tiniest of flaws. TFA is filled with flaws big and small. But you know what? That's ok. It doesn't mean it's not a fun, endearing movie. I still enjoy watching it. And it's perfectly fine to admit when parts of it don't quite work. It's not an assault on your taste or experience or anything like that.

LOL.

Let's not forget this guy and his pilot story. YIPEE!!!!

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TFA is ******* perfect and you're wrong to say there are any flaws whatsoever.

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I am about 98% satisfied with it. It could have used more lens flare.

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And Boyega should cut down to one case of Red Bull per day during filming.

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It's just weird to me sometimes how some of you hold onto movies like this and can't admit even the tiniest of flaws. TFA is filled with flaws big and small. But you know what? That's ok. It doesn't mean it's not a fun, endearing movie. I still enjoy watching it. And it's perfectly fine to admit when parts of it don't quite work. It's not an assault on your taste or experience or anything like that.

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And we can't disagree with you?

Sure there are problems with the movie, but I don't believe Rey being a pilot is one of them.

I pretty much agree with TCTTS across the board on this.

TFA is a decent movie, a fun movie, but it's just not a great movie. Some really minor tweaks to the script and the dialogue could have easily cleared up a number of enigmatic things and made it flow better. That being said, I have come to just accept that the major flaws in the film were essentially un-fixable.

The teasers, the hype, all of it looked so good across 2015 and built up so much expectation. But ultimately, at lest for me, the build up brought me back to being a kid over three decades ago, but the actual on the screen product was a disappointment.

Regardless, still looking forward to Rogue One and Episode VIII.

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Personally, this particular flaw doesn't bother ME too much. I recognize it as a weakness in the film But I'm one of those who actually enjoys the EU for background so of course I have read that book others mentioned with the flight simulator (although for the life of me I can't remember the title). I'm also used to Star Wars being a saga where they drop you in the middle and then if you are really curious, you have to be patient and either look it up yourself or hope they explain more about your questions later.

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I think you're thinking of "Before the Awakening"

I think if your standard for Star Wars films is to feel like you did when you were a kid, you are setting yourself up for some serious disappointment.